UNESCO: Education Needs To Fundamentally Change If We Are To Reach Our Global Development Goals

The
new Global Education Monitoring (GEM) Report by UNESCO, shows the potential for
education to propel progress towards all global goals outlined in the new 2030
Agenda for Sustainable Development (SDGs). It also shows that education needs a
major transformation to fulfill that potential and meet the current challenges
facing humanity and the planet.

There is an urgent need for greater headway in
education. On current trends, the world will achieve universal primary
education in 2042, universal lower secondary education in 2059 and universal
upper secondary education in 2084. This means the world would be half a century
late for the 2030 SDG deadline. The Report, Education for people and planet,
shows the need for education systems to step up attention to environmental
concerns. While in the majority of countries, education is the best indicator
of climate change awareness, half of countries’ curricula worldwide do not
explicitly mention climate change or environmental sustainability in their
content.

In OECD countries, almost 40% of 15-year-old students only have basic
knowledge about environmental issues. “A fundamental change is needed in the
way we think about education’s role in global development, because it has a
catalytic impact on the well-being of individuals and the future of our
planet,” said UNESCO Director-General, Irina Bokova.

“Now, more than ever,
education has a responsibility to be in gear with 21st century challenges and
aspirations, and foster the right types of values and skills that will lead to
sustainable and inclusive growth, and peaceful living together.” Education
systems must take care to protect and respect minority cultures and their
associated languages, which contain vital information about the functioning of
ecosystems. But the Report shows 40% of the global population are taught in a
language they don’t understand. Education systems need to ensure they are
giving people vital skills and knowledge that can support the transition to
greener industries, and find new solutions for environmental problems. This
also requires education to continue beyond the school walls, in communities and
the workplace throughout adulthood. Two-thirds of all adults lack financial
literacy; 37% of adults in EU countries attended adult education in 2011. Only
6% of adults in the poorest countries have ever attended literacy programmes.
“If we want a greener planet, and sustainable futures for all, we must ask more
from our education systems than just a transfer of knowledge. We need our
schools, universities and lifelong learning programmes to focus on economic,
environmental and social perspectives that help nurture empowered, critical,
mindful and competent citizens.” said Aaron Benavot, Director of the GEM
Report.

There is also an urgent need for education systems to impart higher
skills aligned with the demands of growing economies, where job skill sets are
fast changing, many being automated. On current trends, by 2020, there will be
40 million too few workers with tertiary education relative to demand. The
Report shows this change is vital: achieving universal upper secondary
education by 2030 in low income countries would lift 60 million out of poverty
by 2050. Inequality in education, interacting with wider disparities, heightens
the risk of violence and conflict. Across 22 countries in sub-Saharan Africa,
regions that have very low average education had a 50% chance of experiencing
conflict within 21 years. The Report calls on governments to start taking
inequalities in education seriously, tracking them by collecting information
directly from families. The Report emphasizes that the new global development
agenda calls for education ministers and other education actors to work in collaboration
with other sectors. It lists various benefits that could come from this way of
working, including: - Health interventions could be delivered through schools:
by one estimation, delivering simple treatments such as micronutrient pills
through schools is one tenth of the cost of doing it through mobile health
units. - Farmer field schools could help increase crop yields by 12% leading to
sustainable increases in food production - Educating mothers to lower secondary
education in sub-Saharan Africa by 2030 could prevent 3.5 million child deaths
between 2050-60

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